Euro 2012 Day 7: Fuck Spain

Fuck you, Spain.

Fuck your red shirts and your Ole-Ole-Oleing up and down the goddamn streets and stadiums and bars and cafes of Europe and fuck your bailout you said you’d never get and finally did and your tomato throwing economy that was supposed to shine but is really only shit and fuck your colonial conquests that is the stain of American history and fuck Columbus and fuck Cortez the killer and fuck your big dumb soldiers of God ripping down Incan shrines replacing them with statues of a fucking Virgin whose name you killed in and fuck your Inquisition it’s okay to be Jewish you know and fuck your own inner colonial experiment why don’t you just let Catalans be Catalans and Bascos be Bascos they don’t fucking care about your country and they don’t give a shit about your fucking footballfutbolsoccer team and fuck Paella and fuck your bulls who never have a fighting chance and fuck the matadoros in their tight pants and fuck Hemingway and fuck your players with their angular sideways mohawks and fuck your wines you think are better than Italy’s and France’s but which aren’t and fuck Sangria it’s just fruit juice and wine and fuck your beaches and your beautiful women with olive skin and eyes as wide as moors and fuck your last Euro title and fuck your World Cup title even though that day ended really well for me and fuck your lispy fucking C’s it’s a fucking cerveza not a thervetha, and most of all fuck Xavi or Xabi and fuck Fernando Torres and his dumb fucking headband and his stupid third fucking goal against Ireland and fuck sports journalism with its 11 million results in a google search for games that last 90 minutes and end in a scoreless draws and have no fights and fuck journalistic integrity with its insistence on objectivity while subjecting us to the hateful pundits and fear mongerers and fuck the CRTC and fucking censors that prohibit the word fuck but throws the word rape and war and torture around like they were practice balls on the fucking pitch of life.

Fuck that and fuck all of you.

I’m starting to understand footballfutbolsoccer now.

It’s really just about finding something you love and finding any reason to hate people who are better at it than you.

Still, there’s something about pedalling a bicycle through a quiet East-Berlin neighbourhood while the song of Irish supporters fills the streets from neighbourhood cafes in bars as the last light of day goes down at 10.30pm while Spanish fans remain silent and respectful of Irish fans and their desire to share a country song with the world and mark their presence at a tournament they battled, fought and bled to qualify for. It’s almost enough to say, Okay Spain, okay, you’re in this Europe thing too and you’re also struggling with the Euro and you economists failed you too and you’re doing your best and your kids just want to find good jobs too and not see their future pissed away by banks which only see you as consumers and interest payers and governments that only see you as taxpayers and even though I hate your footballfutbolsoccer team we can at least share a mutual desire for a future uncorrupted by a system none of us chose and politicians who use us and make empty promises to us and who land on fat pensions when the going gets tough when the rest of us have lost our prospects and our pensions and our healthcare and our once accessible universities and maybe we can both agree that this thing called austerity meted out by those who caused a crisis yet bear none of the brunt is really just a call that will go tragically uncalled by officials blinded by the promise of an invisible hand which is only really ever seen when it’s around our necks and tightening like a noose and maybe just maybe the day will come that we stand in our green shirts and Irish songs and red shirts and Ole ole oles and we sway arm in arm like the brothers and sisters we were meant to be as the ideas and the banks and the system that united us in crisis finally breathe their last breath and we can all make sweet  love to each other and make Spanish babies with orange hair and olive skin that speak Spanish with Irish accents and all play on the same team and always win and win together. But until then:

Fuck you Spain, and fuck your fucking football team.

Spain 4 Ireland 0.